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| Birth Name(s) : Kenneth Charles Branagh |
Date of Birth: December 10, 1960 |
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| Profession:
Actor |
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Full Kenneth Branagh Biography
| Kenneth Charles Branagh was born on December 10, 1960 in Belfast, Northern Ireland, UK to parents William Branagh, a carpenter born in 1930, and Frances Branagh, also born in 1930. He has a brother named William Branagh Jr. who was born in 1955 and a sister named Joyce Branagh born in 1970. At 23, Kenneth joined the Royal Shakespeare Company, where he took on starring roles in Henry V and Romeo and Juliet. He soon found the R.S.C. too large and impersonal and formed his own, the Renaissance Theatre Company, which now counts Prince Charles as one of its royal patrons. At 29, he directed and starred in the film Henry V (1989), which costarred his then-wife, Emma Thompson. The film brought him Best Actor and Best Director Oscar nominations. In 1993, he brought Shakespeare to mainstream audiences again with his hit adaptation of Much Ado About Nothing (1993), which featured an all-star cast that included Denzel Washington and Keanu Reeves. At 30, he published his autobiography and at 34 he directed and starred as Victor Frankenstein in the big-budget adaptation of Mary Shelley's Frankenstein (1994) with Robert De Niro as the monster himself. The bad reviews may have had some effect on his marriage, though, because in October 1995, Branagh and Thompson announced their plans to divorce. |
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Additional Kenneth Branagh Biography
Kenneth Charles Branagh (born December 10, 1960) is an Emmy Award-winning, Academy Award-nominated Northern Irish-born actor and film director.
Branagh was born in Belfast to working-class Protestant parents Frances (Harper) and William Branagh, a carpenter who ran a company that specialised in fitting partitions and suspended ceilings. He was educated at Grove Primary School. At the age of nine, he relocated with his family to Reading in England to escape the Troubles between Protestants and Catholics.
Branagh achieved some early measure of success in his native Northern Ireland for his role as the title character in the BBC's Play for Today series known as the Billy Plays, written by Graham Reid and set in Belfast. He has worked on both stage and screen. He received initial acclaim in the UK for his stage performances, including the title role in Hamlet. More recently, in 2003, he starred in the Royal National Theatre's production of David Mamet's Edmond.
Branagh is probably best known for his film adaptations of the works of William Shakespeare, beginning with Henry V in 1989, Much Ado About Nothing, Love's Labour's Lost, and Hamlet, with As You Like It' following in 2006. As You Like It premiered in theatres in Europe, but was sent directly to television in the U.S., where it had its U.S. premiere on HBO in August of 2007. Although Branagh played the role of Iago on the 1995 Othello, he did not direct the film; it was directed by Oliver Parker. Othello is the one Shakespeare film that Branagh has appeared in which was directed by someone else.
Branagh has also been involved in several made-for-TV films. Among his most acclaimed portrayals is that of US President Franklin D. Roosevelt (FDR) in the 2005 film Warm Springs. Though the film received sixteen Emmy nominations, winning five (including Best Made-For-Television Film), Branagh did not win the award for his portrayal. He did, however, receive an Emmy award for his performance in the 2001 TV Conspiracy, a depiction of the Wannsee Conference, where Nazi officials conceived the Final Solution. Branagh's award winning performance was for the part of Reinhard Heydrich.
Branagh has been nominated for four Academy Awards. His first two nominations were for Henry V (one each for directing and acting), then one for the 1992 film short subject Swan Song, and again for his work on the screenplay of Hamlet in 1996. Included amongst his many other accolades is a nomination for “worst” supporting actor Razzie in 1999 for his performance in the film Wild Wild West. Branagh has co-starred several times with actress Emma Thompson, to whom he was married from 1989 to 1995. They appeared together in Henry V, Much Ado About Nothing, Dead Again, and Peter's Friends. For several years he was in a well-publicised relationship with Helena Bonham Carter, with whom he also starred and directed in Mary Shelley's Frankenstein. In 2003 he married film art director Lindsay Brunnock , to whom he was introduced by Bonham Carter in 1997.
In 1990, at age 30, Branagh authored an autobiography, which he entitled Beginning, and has narrated several audio books such as The Magician's Nephew by C.S. Lewis.
In 1994, Branagh declined an appointment as a Commander of the Order of the British Empire (CBE). Branagh was the youngest actor to receive the Golden Quill (also known as the Gielgud Award) in 2000.
Branagh began his directing career with Henry V at the age of 29, and from 1989 to 1996 appeared mostly in films he also directed. The commercial failure of Love's Labours Lost in 2000 temporarily ended Branagh's career behind the camera, but he has recently begun directing features again, most recently the thriller Sleuth.
Branagh is Honorary President of NICVA (the Northern Ireland Council for Voluntary Action.) He received an honorary doctorate in Literature from Queen's University of Belfast in 1990. He is also a patron for the charity Over The Wall. |
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Kenneth Branagh Quote(s)
| I think the best actors are the most generous, the kindest, the greatest people and at their worst they are vain, greedy and insecure. |
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